Red Star Line Museum

A few years ago on an ‘Open Construction Sites’ day I had a look at the old buildings of the Red Star Line in Antwerp, a well-known means to leave Europe behind about (more or less) a century ago. It was the last chance to see the original buildings as their renovation was to start soon and it would be turned into a museum. Those who are interested can have a peek at my old post HERE. It also contains information what the immigrants had to go through which I will not repeat here.

The museum opened last year and was such a success that it took me a while to get in. What makes it really interesting are the stories told by the guide or can be listened to as prerecorded versions. As I mentioned in my older post, a lot of hope but also a lot of pain… the example of a small child not being allowed to board with her parents as she was ill, being sent back several times – that is one that ends well and she finally makes it after some years. Another one, mentally a child of three while eight years old (I think…) who would remain that way all her life, not able to pass some simple test… though she too tried several times again, she never could see her parents again after they left… It gives you the shivers what some regulations can do to people…

And again I cannot help thinking of the present migration problems in our time and world…

Of course there was also a first class on those ships, something quite different from the small cabins where ‘the masses’ were packed together, the steerage people…